Pinkett Smith to boycott Oscars

Michelle Loewenstein

Jada Pinkett Smith has confirmed she will be boycotting the Oscars this year.

This comes after last week’s Oscar nominees announcement, where there was a blatantly obvious lack of non-white contenders. This led to social media users posting numerous complaints online with the #OscarsSoWhite tag.

Pinkett Smith’s husband Will was nominated for a Golden Globe for his role in Concussion, but was snubbed by the Oscars panel. In a video on her Facebook page, the actress said she felt the onus was on black people to be the driving force for change.

“Maybe it’s time that we pull back our resources and we put them back into our communities, into our programmes and we make programmes for ourselves that acknowledge us in ways that we see fit that are just as good as the ‘mainstream ones’,” the actress said.

“Begging for acknowledgement diminishes dignity and diminishes power.” For host Chris Rock, she had this to say: “Hey Chris, I will not be at the Academy Awards and I won’t be watching. But I can’t think of a better man to do the job at hand than you.”